27 Wagons Full of Cotton and Other Plays
Page 4
FLORA: (dragging herself up by the chain of the swing) I’m not—Baby. Mama! Ma! That’s—me. . . . (Cradling the big white purse in her arms, she advances slowly and tenderly to the edge of the porch. The moon shines full on her smiling and ravaged face. She begins to rock and sway gently, rocking the purse in her arms and crooning.)
Rock-a-bye Baby—in uh tree-tops!
If a wind blows—a cradle will rock! (She descends a step.)
If a bough bends—a baby will fall! (She descends another step.)
Down will come Baby—cradle—an’—all! (She laughs and stares raptly and vacantly up at the moon.)
CURTAIN
The Purification
A play in verse to be performed with a musical accompaniment on the guitar. The action takes place in the Western ranch-lands over a century ago. The characters are Spanish ranchers and Indians.
The place-names used in this play are associated mainly with the country around Taos, New Mexico, but that is merely because those names and that country come most familiarly to my mind: it is the clear, breath-taking sort of country that I like to imagine as the background for the play. Actually I do not know whether or not people of this type ever lived there and I don’t believe it matters.
For MARGO JONES
CHARACTERS
THE JUDGE: An aristocratic rancher of middle age.
THE SON: A youth of twenty, handsome, irrationally tense of feeling.
THE MOTHER: Pure blooded Castillian with iron-gray hair; she is dressed in rich mourning.
THE FATHER: Tall and gaunt, a steady wine-drinker: brooding and slow of movement.
THE RANCHER FROM CASA ROJO: The burnt-out shell of a longing that drove to violence. His blood is coarser than the people from Casa Blanca. But he is a man of dignity and force.
LUISA: An Indian servant-woman—some Spanish blood. A savage nature. She wears a good deal of jewelry and a brilliant shawl.
AN INDIAN YOUTH
A CHORUS OF THREE MEN AND THREE WOMEN, Ranchers.
THE GUITAR PLAYER: He wears a domino and a scarlet-lined cape—he sits on a stool beside the wide arched doorway.
ELENA OF THE SPRINGS and THE DESERT ELENA: Two visions of the same character—the lost girl.
The Purification
SCENE: A bare room, white or pearl gray. A number of plain wooden benches, a small square table for the Judge. Skull of a steer on wall. The wide arched door admits a vista of plain and sky: the sky is a delicate aquamarine: the plain pale gold. A range of purplish mountains between. Two high-set windows with sunlight slanting through them.
A crime has been committed: an informal trial is being conducted. The Chorus file silently onto the stage and seat themselves on the benches as the curtain rises. Next comes The Guitar Player. He plays softly as the main characters come in. The Judge remains standing back of the table till the others are seated.
SCENE I
THE JUDGE:
Well, my neighbors, I know about as much of court-procedure as any reasonably well-informed jack-rabbit.
Nevertheless I seem to be the Judge.
And I was put in office more, I hope, for what you know about me than what I know.
I do not believe in one man judging another:
I’d rather that those who stand in need of judgment would judge themselves.
Honor being
more than a word amongst us
I have no doubt
that this is the kind of judgment which will prevail.
We’re all of us ranchers—neighbors—
Our enmities, sometimes bloody, are usually brief.
Our friendships—longer lasting.
And that is good. . . . What I mean to say is simply this—
We know each other sufficiently well, I think, to get along without much ceremony.
An evil thing has occurred.
The reasons are still beclouded.
This much we know: the rains are long delayed.
The season is parched.
Our hearts, like forests stricken by the drought, are quick to flame.
Well, flames have broken out, not only in the Lobos, but here, between two ranches.
Rain is needed.
Rain’s the treatment for a forest fire.
For violent deeds likewise the rain is needed.
The rain I speak of is the rain of truth, for truth between men is the only purification.
How is it over the Lobos, Señor Moreno?
RANCHER: (the one nearest the door) Clouded a little.
JUDGE: Bueno!
(catching sight of a flask)
Drinking inside is forbidden—outside is not my business So let’s get on with what we have come to do.
You neighbors from Casa Blanca—
I ask you first to speak concerning your daughter—
(facing The Mother)
You, the mother,
what do you have to say?
(The Mother bows her head.)
FATHER: She cannot speak.
JUDGE: Can you?
FATHER: Not like a man with any of his senses.
JUDGE:
Then like a man without them, if you will—
But speak up freely—
Speak out the broken language of your hearts and we’ll supply the sense where it seems to be needed. (Chord on guitar)
FATHER:
It is not easy to tell you about our daughter.
Her name was Elena.
SON:
She had no name for no one here could name her.
MOTHER: Her name—was Elena.
SON:
Her skeleton, much too elastic, stitched together the two lost frozen blue poles!
(A murmur among The Chorus)
LUISA: The tainted spring—is bubbling.
FATHER:
He means to say she went beyond our fences.
SON:
I mean to say she went beyond all fences.
The meadow grasses continued entirely too far beyond where the gate
was broken—in several—places . . .
LUISA: (mockingly) Listen—bubbling, bubbling!
FATHER: Our son is demented.
MOTHER: Since the death of our daughter.
LUISA: The tainted spring—is bubbling!
(The Chorus murmur. The Judge raises his hand to warn them.)
JUDGE: The boy would speak?
MOTHER: (quickly) He is not able to speak!
JUDGE:
I think he can speak, but in the language of vision.
Rosalio, would you speak concerning your sister?
SON: (slowly rising)
Her eyes were always excessively clear in the morning.
Transparency is a bad omen in very young girls!
It makes flight
necessary
sometimes!
(facing his parents)
You should have bought her the long crystal beads that she wanted . . .
MOTHER: (gently, not looking up)
But how could we know she would have been satisfied with them?
SON:
Oh, I know, Mother,
you fear that she might have desired
to discover reflections in them
of something much farther away
than those spring freshets she bathed in,
naked, clasping her groin
rigidly, with both palms,
against the cold
immaculate kiss of snow-water!
(The Chorus murmur)
LUISA: The tainted spring—is bubbling!
(The Rancher places a restraining hand on Luisa’s shoulder.)
FATHER:
He means to say she went beyond our fences.
SON:
Beyond all fences, Father.
She knew also glaciers, intensely blue, valleys, brilliant with sunlight, lemon-yellow, terrific!
And desolation that stretched too widely apart the white breast-bones of her body!
(The Father touches his arm but he continues, facing the door.)
SON: (violently)
Not even noon’s
thundering
statement
crescendo
of distance!
Knocking down walls
with two
blue
brutal
bare fists
clenched over quicksilver
could ever—(tenderly)
could certainly never—enclose such longing as was my sister’s!
How much less night, fearlessly stating with stars that breathless inflection—
Forever?
(The wordless singing rises. The wide arched portal that gives on the aquamarine of the desert sky now lightens with a ghostly radiance. Bells toll softly. The guitar weaves a pattern of rapture.
Rosalio’s sister, Elena of the Springs, steps into the doorway. She wears a sheer white robe and bears white flowers. With slender candle-like fingers she parts the shawl that covers her head and reveals her face. Her lips are smiling. But only The Son Rosalio is aware of the apparition—he and The Guitar Player. The others stare at the Indian woman, Luisa, who rises stiffly from the bench beside The Rancher from Casa Rojo.)
LUISA: (clutching her wooden beads)
You have heard the dead lady compared to mountain water.
A very good comparison, I think.
I once led goats through the mountains:
we stopped to drink.
It seemed the purest of fountains.
Five of the goat herd died.
I only survived because I had promised the master that I would return in time for the Feast of the Virgin . . .
The water was crystal—but it was fouled at the source.
The water was—tainted water!
(The girl of the vision lowers her head and covers her face and her garland with the shawl. The guitar plays—sad and sinister. She turns and withdraws from the doorway.)
SON: (springing furiously at the servant) Madre de Dios!
JUDGE: Restrain him!
(The Father holds him back, dramatic chords on the guitar.)
SON: This whore should be made to taste of the bastinado!
MOTHER:
Patience, my son.
The zopilote will croak—we cannot prevent it!
JUDGE: You people from Casa Blanca will serve us best in advancing your own satisfaction by holding the peace until this witness has finished.
(to Luisa)
Go on, Señora. But please to avoid uncalled-for offense to these people.
LUISA:
The youth’s demented. That’s true.
He used to ride on his pony past our place.
He cried out loud to some invisible creatures as even a moment ago you saw his rapturous gaze at an empty doorway.
The moon, I suspect, has touched his head too fondly.
CHORUS:
The moon, we suspect, has touched his head too fondly.
(They nod and mumble.)
LUISA:
You know how it is in August?
In August the heavens take on more brilliance, more fire.
They become—unstable.
And then I believe it is well to stay indoors, to keep yourself at a sensible occupation.
This one lacked prudence, however.
He rode at night, bare-back, through the Sangre de Cristo, shouting aloud and making ridiculous gestures.
(The guitar plays—lyrical chords.)
You know how it is in August?
CHORUS: Yes, in August!
LUISA:
The stars make—sudden excursions.
The moon’s—lopsided.
The dogs go howling like demons about the ranches.
CHORUS: Howling like demons!
LUISA:
I’m wise—I stay indoors.
But this one here, this youth from Casa Blanca, continually raced and raced through the mountain larches—until exhaustion stopped him.
When he stopped—it was not always in his own enclosures.
(The Chorus gossip and nod. The Judge warns them.)
No—
He pastured his pony some nights at Casa Rojo.
His visits were unannounced except by the pony’s neighing in the distance, borne down windward.
On one such occasion as this I climbed upstairs to notify the mistress.
This was unnecessary: her bed was empty:
the covers—thrown aside.
(Guitar. The Chorus whisper. The Judge silences them.)
I did not trouble the master, he was sleeping, but went alone through the meadow: the grasses were chill: I shivered:
I bore no lantern—the starlight proved sufficient.
I had not come to the barn when suddenly through the window of the loft, that was lit with the wavering radiance of a candle—two naked figures appeared in a kind of—dance . . .
(Loud dramatic chords on the guitar. Castanets and drums.
Shocked murmur among the women. The Chorus rise and talk among themselves.)
RANCHER: Basta! Basta, Luisa!
(He clenches his hands in torment.)
LUISA: Someone has got to speak!
MOTHER: (rising)
So at last it is out—this infamous slander whispered against our house!
(Silence.)
FATHER: (choked) What man of this woman’s people will answer for it?
LUISA:
I am alone.
I’ll answer for it myself.
THE JUDGE:
Resume your seats, mis vecinos.
It is foolish to feign surprise at the charge now spoken.
A thing so persistently whispered in our kitchens is better spoken out in the presence of all.
So now it is necessary to face it squarely.
(The guitar plays—tragic, tormented. The Son looks down without moving.)
LUISA: (smiling) Why doesn’t he stand?
FATHER: Rosalio, stand!—And speak!
MOTHER: (rising) No!—Wait!
(She speaks softly, tenderly, and makes delicate gestures with her hands which are ringed with rubies and sapphires.)
My son is the victim of an innocent rapture.
His ways are derived of me.
I also rode on horseback through the mountains in August as well as in March—
I also shouted and made ridiculous gestures before I grew older and learned the uselessness of it . . .
If this imputes some dark guilt on the doer,
Then I, his mother, must share in this public censure.
Sangre mala—call it.
CHORUS: (whispering) Sangre mala! Sangre mala!
MOTHER:
Our people—were Indian-fighters . . .
The Indians now are subdued—
So what can we do but contend with our own queer shadows?
THE JUDGE: Señora—
MOTHER:
Bear with me a while, for I must explain things to you.
FATHER:
Callate, Maria!
Rosalio, stand and speak!
(The Son looks at The Judge.)
THE JUDGE: Yes, Rosalio, speak.
(The Son rises slowly, twisting the length of white rope between his hands.)
SON: What do you want me to tell you?
THE JUDGE: (smiling) Simply the truth.
SON:
The truth?
Why ask me for that?
Ask it of him, the player—for truth is sometimes alluded to in music.
But words are too loosely woven to catch it in . . .
A bird can be snared as it rises or torn to earth by the falcon.
His song, which is truth, is not to be captured ever.
It is an image, a dream, it is the link to the mother, the belly’s rope that dropped our bodies from God a longer time ago than we remember!
I—forget.
(The Chorus murmur.)
LUISA: The tainted spring—is bubbling.
SON: Player! Prompt me with music.
(The Guitar Player sweeps the strings.)
SON: (with a sudden smile)
How shall I describe the effect that a song had on us?
On nights of fiesta the ranch-boys, eager with May, surrounded our fences with little drum-gourds, with guitars.
(facing The Mother)
You, Mother, would wash the delicate white lace curtains, sweep down the long stairs and scent the alcoves with lemon.
(Chord on the guitar.)
How shall I describe the effect that a song had on us?
Our genitals were too eager!
MOTHER: (involuntarily) No!
LUISA: Listen!
SON:
Player, prompt me with music For I have lost the thread.
Weave back my sister’s image.
(Music)
No. She’s lost,
Snared as she rose,
or torn to earth by the falcon!
No, she’s lost,
Irretrievably lost,
Gone out among Spanish-named ranges.
(He smiles vaguely.)
Too far to pursue except on the back of that lizard . . .
LUISA: Bubbling! Bubbling!
MOTHER: Rosalio!
(The Father touches her shoulder.)
SON:
. . . Whose green phosphorescence,
scimitar-like,
disturbs midnight
with hissing, metallic sky-prowling . . .
JUDGE:
Is this the chimera you,
you moon-crazed youth,
pursued through the mountains?
SON: No . . .
(Luisa laughs harshly.)
LUISA:
How shall he describe the effect that a song had on him!
SON: I washed my body in snow.
LUISA: Because it was shameful!
SON:
Yes!
And now you may know
How well indeed I succeeded in putting out fires.
My sister is free.
(To The Rancher)
His hand gave liberty to her.
But mine—a less generous agent—
Only gave her—longings . . .
(The Mother cries out. The Father rises. The Chorus murmur.)
LUISA: Sangre mala!
(A peal of thunder outside.)
JUDGE:
A house that breeds in itself will breed destruction.
LUISA: Sangre mala!
FATHER: (passionately)
In our blood was the force that carved this country!